The United States and Japan will step up their defence cooperation to deal with the threat from nuclear-armed North Korea as tensions in East Asia remain high, officials from the two allies said on Thursday.

Guards' narrow escape from crashing giant tree

Border guards in Thailand are counting themselves lucky after a giant tree crashed down across the road they were patrolling, narrowly missing them.

A CCTV video filmed on Saturday shows five men at a vehicle check point near the city of Chiang Mai, in the country’s north, near the Burmese border, where drug smuggling and illegal migration is rife.

Video shows the soldiers start to run from the orange barriers on the road.

But it’s not a speeding vehicle or armed smugglers they run from in the video, released on YouTube by Chiang Mai News.

The danger is from above as a giant shadow creeps across the screen and a huge tree comes crashing down across the road, narrowly missing the fleeing men.

Thailand’s forests, like much of South East Asia, have been ravaged by industrial agriculture, cattle ranching, illegal logging and infrastructure construction.

But recently a unique reforestation programme began in parts of the country. This involved ‘seed bombing’ or aerial reforestation, where trees and other crops are planted by being thrown or dropped from an airplane or flying drone.